Is sex-specific longevity evident in Scopoli's Shearwater Calonectris diomedea?

Abstract

Breeding colonies of Scopoli鈥檚 Shearwater Calonectris diomedea are on remote, typically uninhabited islets which often are of limestone or volcanic morphology. Nests can be under dense shrub, between roots of juniper, in rabbit holes on flat ground, in crevices on slopes, or in slots of cliffs. Depending on what the island surface offers, nests can be spaced just a few metres or more than a hundred metres apart. Irrespective of the size of an entrance to a spacious cave, be its ceiling just of a foot or of a man鈥檚 height, several nests may be in corners close to the cave entrance or many metres deep inside the rock. It is therefore the skill of the investigator with his tools to reach a high degree of retrap-completeness when doing a population study in a given plot for determining survival rates.